The present invention concerns an iron, notably a steam iron, having a water reservoir, a reservoir containing a textile additive, and a pump comprising a mixing chamber and capable, on the one hand, of aspirating into the mixing chamber a dose of water from the water reservoir as well as of additive from the additive reservoir via a tap permitting dosing of the additive, in a manner to produce in the mixing chamber a diluted solution of the additive, and on the other hand, of conveying this solution toward a spraying device situated in the forward part of the iron.
It is known that with such an iron, the spraying onto fabric of a diluted active product serves to facilitate ironing while improving sliding and removing creases.
In a known iron of this type, the water reservoir is connected to the aspiration pump by a capillary tube, while the tap permitting dosing of the additive is equally connected to the pump by another capillary tube. Such an arrangement of these various organs is particularly disparate and bulky and is difficult to produce during manufacture of the iron,
The invention has particularly for its object to eliminate these inconveniences and to produce an iron, of the type set forth hereabove, in which the organs for pumping and dosing the additive are grouped together, this in view of simplifying their installation in the iron.
In an iron according to the invention the pump is of the piston type being displaced in a body and delimiting in the lower part of the body the mixing chamber that opens into the water reservoir via a one-way valve, and this pump equally serves as an additive dosing tap.
The pump and the additive dosing tap are thus grouped into a compact unitary body. In addition, the pump itself advantageously fulfills a double function, which is that of pumping to aspirate water and additive, and that of dosing of the additive intended to be mixed with the aspirated water, thus constituting in itself a true dosing pump of a mixture of water and textile additive. Such a dosing pump can be produced in the form of a small pump, thus occupying a small volume in the iron.
According to one manner of construction of the invention, the piston comprises two spaced mobile opening-closing organs, respectively called upper and lower, mounted in the body of the pump in delimiting between them a dosing chamber, and controlled respectively by first and second actuation means linked to the piston, said upper and lower organs being mobile between a rest position in which the upper organ is open, while the lower organ is closed, in a manner to permit the passage of a dose of additive from the additive reservoir toward the dosing chamber, and a working position in which the upper organ is closed under the action of the first actuation means, while the lower organ is opened under the action of the second actuation means, in a manner to permit passage of the dose of additive from the dosing chamber toward the mixing chamber.
The two mobile opening-closing organs, delimiting between them the dosing chamber, thus together play the role of a tap integrated into the pump itself and adapted to dose the additive intended to be mixed with the water aspirated by the pump.
According to another characteristic of the invention, the additive reservoir forms an integral part of the pump. Thus, the dosing pump and the additive reservoir advantageously constitute a unitary body that is particularly compact.